Half the Sky Discussion Questions

According to the authors of Half the Sky, what makes a woman vulnerable to violence, poverty, and human trafficking?

A woman is vulnerable to violence, poverty, and human trafficking when she is not considered a full human being. In societies where girls and women are devalued, they have no rights. In highly patriarchal societies, Kristof and WuDunn argue, girls and women are seen as subhuman: a form of property that the dominant males can do with as they please. This often means that men can abuse girls and women violently or through neglect without legal or social repercussions. In some such societies, female infants are killed outright or left to die because of their lack of perceived worth.

Because girls and women are treated as property in these communities, in some poor families the men or even female relatives feel they can sell the girls to traffickers to make some money to support the family. The traffickers then sell the girls on to brothels. In the brothels, the women are kept captive and sexually abused and beaten until they submit to their fate. Because their society deems them of no value, girls and women have no power to complain or to seek justice for their suffering. Most girls in such highly conservative societies obtain little or no formal education, so they may have no idea how to redress the mistreatment they suffer.

Based on the problems and solutions described in Half the Sky, what would gender equality look like around the world?

If the whole world worked toward and accepted gender equality, women would be as prominent and as independent as men are today. In the public sphere, true gender equality would affect education, employment, and political decision-making. The world’s women would be offered—and might choose to get—the same amount of education as men; many of them would likely attend graduate school and pursue careers in law, medicine, or other highly respected professions. Global gender equality could mean that women owned and operated as many businesses as men or led the companies they work for from highly responsible positions. Women would also rise to positions of political power in governments all over the world.

In the private sphere, a gender-equal world would see the tasks involved in raising children, caring for family members, and maintaining the home shared equally between men and women. With most women gainfully employed, governments would likely enact laws giving both men and women in a family the right to paid family leave in an emergency. The family would also benefit from affordable childcare provided by or subsidized by the state if both parents work. As Kristof and WuDunn show, domestic violence—often of a fatal kind—proliferates in societies where women are deemed subordinate. Conversely, there would likely be far less domestic violence in households where women’s status equaled that of men.

Why is economic and financial power important to women, according to Half the Sky?

When women depend on men for their survival—for food, shelter, health care, or other necessities—they inevitably have less power than the men and are subject to the men’s willingness (or unwillingness) to provide for them. This subjugates women and puts them in a position of low-status dependence.

When women have the opportunity to get an education, they can then go out and get jobs or start their own businesses to earn their own money. The ability to earn money confers both status and independence on a working woman. Economic power leads to individual and social power. A woman who contributes her earnings to the support of the family almost invariably has a greater say in how the family is run, how the children are educated, and how family decisions are made.

Once a woman has achieved a degree of financial independence, she is able to expand her sphere of experience and may better realize what once were unattainable goals. A woman who has economic power can use that power to enter politics and run for office; she may even be able to fund her own campaign. A woman who earns a good living may also have the financial ability to hire someone to help with housework, freeing her up to pursue other goals. 

Why does Half the Sky describe reproductive health as a human rights issue?

One takeaway from Half the Sky is that everyone who gets sick or needs medical attention deserves to have access to it: medical care should be the right of all people, regardless of their ability to pay. That makes medical care a basic human right. Any physical condition that endangers the life of a human being should therefore be attended to by qualified medical professionals.

Childbearing can be a difficult and even life-threatening event that only prompt and professional medical care can address. For this reason, Kristof and WuDunn argue reproductive health should be at the top of the list as a human rights issue. Since pregnant women are bringing new human life into the world, reproductive health is an issue that concerns the rights of both mother and child. In developing countries, women are sometimes so devalued they are denied lifesaving medical care during pregnancy and childbirth, care that would be considered standard elsewhere. The discrepancy, as Kristof and WuDunn point out, is not just one of money or infrastructure but one of attitudes, as the accounts of maternal mortality in Chapters 6 and 7 bear out. This is one of the main reasons that maternal mortality is considered a measure of a nation’s dedication not only to women’s rights but to human rights in general. When “disposable” women are allowed to die in childbirth for lack of medical attention, that country is branded as having a poor human rights record. Even in developed nations, inequities in maternal mortality across income, social status, and race are seen as a blot on that nation’s commitment to human rights.

According to Half the Sky, why is education important to women?

Education empowers poor women living in developing countries. Without even a basic education, a woman in a developing nation is typically confined to a life of poverty and often abuse. When a woman gets an education, her world broadens. Her learning makes her more independent and gives her ideas more weight and consideration by others. Education enables a woman to understand the opportunities open to her that she knew nothing about before she attended school. It also empowers her to speak for herself, as Usha Narayane did in her confrontation with a local gangster.

In countries around the world, regardless of development status, women who are educated frequently seek employment or start their own business in order to earn their own money. The extra income improves the lot of their children and other family members. It may also improve the standard of living within the community if a woman hires neighbors to work in her business or spends more money at local markets and stores.

Moreover, poor rural women in the developing world often use their earnings to lift up other uneducated women. Kristof and WuDunn describe numerous examples of women who get an education and a job and then use the money they earn to establish local aid organizations to educate other poor rural women in their village or region. Some of these women open their own schools to educate the women in their locality. They do this because, as educated women, they understand from experience how empowering an education is and how it helps them improve their lives.